When Remus looks up, his vision is blurry and his head a little swimmy. He thinks he just might throw up again, but he doesn't say so. There's a hand on his back and still that question hanging in the air. He bites the heel of his hand to quell the nausea, and thinks.
No, is what he wants to say. He wants to say that he feels like shit and can barely stand, let alone walk, but he'll be fine, he just wants to get back to the dorm and sleep; he's fine, it'll pass, don't worry about him. It was just breakfast not sitting right, and then potions, and then the burning incense from Divinations, which didn't help any.
No, is what he wants to say. He feels more and more isolated and alienated with every new moon, despite everything and everyone. He sits in class and takes notes and does the spells and bites his nails, and maybe if he's lucky, Sirius will talk to him. A right laugh that is, since Sirius is his best friend and all. He thinks everyone's afraid of him, even though no one knows. He thinks Sirius is afraid of him, especially because he knows.
No, is what he wants to say. He's a bloody monster, what do you expect. Even if Sirius is there with him every cycle, he can still feel it: feel the taint, growing and spreading, covering up the parts of himself he likes best with a slick coat of oily film, so thick in his body and blood and mind and heart that he's losing who he is. Soon, he'll be nothing but a shadow, lost in the monster, with nothing anyone can do about it.
No, is what he wants to say. Sirius is what he's holding onto, with a grip that was once strong and sure, but now slips a little with each transformation. He once knew how to disassociate himself from the monster with Sirius' help, but the difference isn't so clear anymore. He's utterly in love, or he used to be, before he lost that part of himself. Sirius used to know how pull him back into himself, or he thought so, because it always worked. But not anymore, because the more Sirius has to pull, the harder Remus has to fall, and he hasn't got anything left to give away.
"Yes," is what he says instead, "just give me a minute."